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  ‘Hello, Mr Travis-Lock,’ Dora changed legs briskly, ‘you haven’t met Mrs Bancroft.’

  Alban leapt to his feet, nearly concussing himself on a low beam, and offered to buy Etta and Dora a drink as an excuse to fill his own glass.

  ‘That’s so kind, I’ve got one,’ said Etta.

  ‘Put one in for Dora and Mrs Bancroft, Chris,’ called out Alban. ‘Same again for me.’

  Travis-Lockjaw, thought Etta, as Alban spoke through clenched teeth. He had receding hair, a domed forehead, big mournful turned-down eyes, a snub nose above a long upper lip and a big mouth. Not unlike an elder-statesman orang-utan campaigning for the preservation of the species.

  Cadbury, hopeful of pork scratchings, put his head on Alban’s brown corduroy thigh.

  ‘Cadbury is deeply in love with Mr Travis-Lock’s Lab, Araminta,’ said Dora.

  Noticing Alban had a most charming smile, showing large but well-tended teeth, Etta said: ‘Dora tells me you were a wonderful ambassador.’

  Alban blushed. ‘One did one’s best, thank you, Dora,’ and noticed that now Mrs Bancroft had taken off her Barbour, her ancient and shrunk navy-blue jersey showed off her pretty breasts and eyes.

  ‘Have you had a bet?’ asked Dora.

  ‘Well, Jase the farrier was in yesterday and said he’d put on Claudia Dearest’s racing plates, and she was an absolute cert, so I think most of Willowwood’s backed her.’

  ‘Alan was going to back Stop Preston,’ volunteered Etta, wondering if he’d remembered to put something on for her.

  They had lunch together near the television. Etta found herself perched on a stool shaped like a fox’s head. Her crab fishcakes were utterly delicious and she noticed Alban wolfed up his Irish stew with similar relish. Dora gave most of her steak to Cadbury.

  Alban glanced wistfully up at a photograph of a lawn meet outside Willowwood Hall.

  ‘That’s your gorgeous garden,’ exclaimed Etta, ‘and that’s you in a topper.’

  ‘Nineteen ninety-five,’ said Alban, ‘back on leave before the posting to Cairo. The one thing I looked forward to in my retirement was buying an ex-chaser and going out three or four days a week. Now it’s banned.’

  ‘I’ve had some excellent runs this season,’ Dora assured him. ‘The hunt meets at the pub in the second week in November,’ she added to Etta. ‘Hounds charged the bar last time, Oxford’s sister led the stampede. You’ll have to come and cheer us on.’

  Etta took a deep breath. ‘I’m so sorry, I don’t approve of hunting – poor fox.’

  ‘Poor fox killed Old Mrs Malmesbury’s gander last week in broad daylight,’ said Dora sternly. ‘He plucked him then ate him, there were feathers everywhere.’

  ‘I know, I know.’ Etta shook her head.

  Seeing the distress on her face, Dora changed the subject.

  ‘This pub is where Joey, Jase the farrier and Woody meet to discuss their syndicate every Wednesday. Their dream is to put Not for Crowe and Family Dog in training with Marius, but I don’t think he’d take them, sweet as they are.’

  ‘Doggie’s a Shetland,’ mocked a pretty girl with long red hair wearing a tight white skirt through which could be seen a leopardskin thong. She had come over to take their plates away. ‘Everything OK?’

  ‘Delicious,’ sighed Etta.

  ‘That’s Chris’s wife,’ whispered Dora. ‘Her name’s Chrissie, which confuses things. Joey fancies her like mad even though he has a very pretty wife, known as Mop Idol, who cleans for Mrs Travis-Lock.’

  ‘She does,’ said Alban happily.

  ‘Because they’re always producing children,’ giggled Dora, ‘Joey’s known as “Go Home for Lunge”.’

  Alban choked on his drink.

  ‘And talk of the devil, here come Joey and Woody to watch the local derby,’ crowed Dora.

  Joey had an all-weather face, foxy, knowing and sensual, a chunky body and the air of one at ease with his fellow men. A gold pen was tucked into his black woolly hat.

  Now that she could see his face, Etta appreciated Woody was indeed a beauty, with wonderful broad shoulders, a lean long-legged body, thick blond curls flecked with sawdust, a smooth forehead, high cheekbones, kind, darkly shadowed, greeny-blue eyes and a beautifully soft mouth.

  Dora, in her element, was about to introduce Etta but the two men just nodded and didn’t come over.

  ‘See your boss has been down to Badger’s Court enjoying empty bedrooms ’ere with his lady friend, Joey,’ shouted Chris, waving the Daily Mail.

  ‘Didn’t tell me,’ snapped Joey, who’d signed a confidentiality agreement not to spread any gossip about Valent and Bonny, and much regretted tipping off Dora, in a moment of weakness, about last week’s visit. Not wanting her to thank him in public, he kept his distance.

  Woody, who had been responsible for planting the mature conifers round Etta’s garden, was also looking sheepish.

  The runners for the one thirty were circling the parade ring.

  ‘There’s Stop Preston,’ said Dora, going towards the television.

  ‘We saw him in the flesh,’ squeaked Etta.

  ‘Mrs Bancroft’s moved into the bungalow next to Valent’s,’ Dora told an approaching Joey. ‘She needs bookshelves and her pictures hanging. She’s mad about horses. What are you two on?’

  ‘Claudia Dearest. Jase said she’d walk it. And an each way on Asbo Andy.’

  ‘Claudia looks a bit peaky to me,’ said Dora.

  ‘Harvey-Holden paid five grand for that mare,’ said Chris disapprovingly. ‘But when his missus, Claudia, pushed off, he sold her to that syndicate for fifty grand.’

  Harvey-Holden, a little man in a flat check cap, could hardly be seen for the syndicate – thick-necked hoods bulging out of their brown shiny suits – that surrounded him.

  ‘Look at them hanging on his every dishonest word,’ said Joey.

  ‘You had a bet?’ asked Woody, looking Etta in the eye for the first time.

  ‘I’m not sure. Alan, my son-in-law, fancied Stop Preston.’

  ‘Looks bloody well,’ said Joey, as the gleaming bay bounded round, shoving his stable lass into the rails. ‘Dubious who’s leading who. Here’s Marius.’

  ‘Gloomy as ever,’ said Chris.

  ‘Gets very strung up,’ said Chrissie.

  ‘Shade will string him up if Stop Preston doesn’t win,’ observed Woody.

  Etta felt so sorry for Marius as he was joined by Shade, who was wearing a belted camel-hair coat, and talking and talking, gesticulating, rings flashing, when Marius, clearly jangling with nerves, wanted to distance himself.

  ‘Look at Shade kissing Olivia on the mouth, bloody letch,’ said Joey. ‘Shade doesn’t rate “Awesome” Wells as a jockey,’ he went on. ‘According to Jase, he wanted Rogue Rogers to ride Stop Preston. Awesome is so thick, if Marius gives him instructions he forgets them by the time he’s up. But he rides bloody well.’

  ‘Preston looks fantastic,’ sighed Dora. ‘Oh dear, he’s bucked Awesome off.’

  ‘Must be hard for Marius,’ said Alban, circling downward-pointed fingers to indicate to Chris that he wanted to buy another round, ‘keeping all these ambitious owners happy. Rupert Campbell-Black can afford to tell them to eff off.’

  The horses were down at the start, Shade’s orange and magenta colours rivalling the yellows, reds and rusts of the turning trees. Preston was tugging at his bit, bouncing on the spot, eyeballing the competition, thinking up new naughtiness.

  Next moment the group round the television were joined by a bustling, self-important figure with a horizontal moustache.

  ‘Are they off yet?’

  ‘Not quite,’ said Chris. ‘Your usual, Major?’

  Major Cunliffe had a gin and tonic and turned to Alban.

  ‘Our lady wives are still in the church.’

  ‘Going to be secateurs at dawn,’ said Alban gloomily.

  The Major had backed Asbo Andy. ‘Can’t stand that chap Oakridge, damn rude whenever
I ask him for a raffle prize.’

  ‘Ride on his wife’s the best prize he could offer,’ leered Chris. ‘She’s a cracker.’

  At first Stop Preston planted himself at the start. Then he decided he didn’t like being left behind and tore after the others, pulling so hard he overtook everyone except Asbo Andy and Claudia Dearest, who suddenly ran out of petrol, despite her jockey beating the hell out of her. The pub was in uproar.

  Overtaking both of them, Stop Preston looked round for companions, wondering whether to feel lonely.

  ‘Come on, Stop Preston,’ yelled Dora.

  ‘Come on, Asbo Andy,’ bellowed the Major.

  ‘Don’t give up, Preston. You can do it,’ screamed Etta, as Asbo Andy passed him again.

  As if hearing her, Preston rallied and passed Asbo Andy once more to win by a head.

  ‘And we might see Marius Oakridge smile for a change,’ said the commentator.

  ‘That horse is exhausted,’ complained Joey, as a fallen-away Claudia Dearest limped in last. ‘I’ll murder Jase.’

  Etta’s squeals of excitement had crescendoed as Stop Preston passed the post. Glancing down, to her horror she found she’d been clutching both Alban and the Major’s hands, which she dropped instantly.

  ‘So sorry,’ she blushed furiously, ‘I got carried away. Oh well done, Marius, hasn’t he got a lovely smile. My son-in-law Alan was backing Preston and said he’d put something on for me, but he’s probably forgotten.’

  As her mobile rang, she jumped in terror. It was bound to be Carrie or Romy catching her gambling and drinking in the pub. She must talk slowly and carefully.

  ‘Hell-o.’

  ‘Darling, it’s Alan.’ Etta slumped with relief. ‘What a win! Nothing could stop Preston. I put twenty pounds on for you and got him at 10–1. That’s two hundred quid.’

  ‘Oh my goodness.’ Etta collapsed on the fox-mask stool. ‘Oh, thank you. Did you back him? We must share it.’

  ‘I put on much more,’ said Alan smugly. ‘Where are you?’

  ‘In the Fox,’ whispered Etta, looking around nervously.

  ‘Put me on to Chris.’

  ‘I’ll lynch Jase,’ said Joey, ‘I was going to back Preston.’

  ‘Hello, young man,’ said Chris, taking Etta’s mobile. ‘Certainly, no problem. You’re right, my son, she’s a lovely lady.’ Chris handed back the mobile, opened the till and peeled Etta off a stack of tenners.

  ‘I’m to pay you now, in case Alan forgets.’

  ‘You don’t have to,’ stammered a deeply embarrassed Etta.

  ‘You take it, Etta, while the goin’s good,’ urged Joey.

  ‘And count it,’ said Woody.

  ‘Well, it must be drinks on me.’ Etta turned to the Major. ‘What would you like, Major Cunliffe?’

  The Major was gratified. ‘You know my name?’

  ‘Dora told me you do so much for the village.’

  ‘About the perving and the nosy parking,’ mumbled Dora.

  ‘I shouldn’t let a lady buy me drinks.’

  ‘Please help me celebrate.’

  ‘Well, I won’t get much done this afternoon, I’ll have another G and T.’

  ‘A gin and tonic,’ Etta told Chris, ‘and another whisky for Mr Travis-Lock,’ then when Alban demurred, ‘you haven’t got far to go. And you too, Joey and Woody.’

  ‘I’ve got some trees to cut back, so I’ll have a Coke or they’ll shout at me for taking too much off.’

  ‘Joey?’ asked Etta.

  ‘As I haven’t got to climb trees this afternoon, I’ll have a pint, thanks, Etta. You’re as good at remembering names as an American.’

  ‘Dora briefed me about everyone,’ said Etta. ‘And she told me about Not for Crowe. And what will you have, Chris and Dora?’

  As she handed everyone their glasses and pork scratchings for Cadbury, the sun came out, gilding the high street, the church and its weathercock.

  ‘Such a charming village,’ sighed Etta.

  ‘And such a charming addition to the village,’ brayed Alban, raising his dark brown glass of whisky to her.

  ‘Hear, hear!’ said the Major enthusiastically.

  ‘Cheers, Etta,’ echoed Chris, Joey and Woody.

  ‘What are we going to back in the next race?’ asked Dora.

  *

  Alas, the Major was so captivated, he went home and told his wife Debbie (who’d just done fifteen rounds with Ione Travis-Lock and was smarting over her despised splash of colour) about Etta.

  ‘She’d had a flutter on Preston – little devil finally came good. Marius actually smiled at the presentation. Etta – that’s Martin and Carrie’s mother – won two hundred pounds and was so excited she bought drinks for all of us.

  ‘Charming lady, knew what regiment I was in. Alban T-L was very smitten.’ The Major glanced at his emails: Parish Council, British Legion, Rugby Club, Rotary Club. ‘Think she’d be a willing hand at coffee mornings.’

  Debbie, who was sourly ramming rejected pillarbox-red dahlias entitled Bishop of Llandaff, George Best and Alan Titchmarsh into a toby jug, said she wasn’t sure how pleased Romy and Martin would be.

  ‘Martin’s mother is supposed to be minding Poppy and Drummond, keeping Harvest Home shipshape and preparing meals, not betting and carousing in public houses.’

  Debbie couldn’t wait to ring Romy, who couldn’t wait to yank Martin out of a sales pitch workshop. Etta’s euphoria, induced by her session in the Fox, had rubbed off on Drummond and Poppy. They were playing snakes and ladders, enjoying egg and tomato pub sandwiches and watching Scooby-Doo at the bungalow, when Martin rang in a rage.

  ‘Romy and I feel utterly let down, Mother. What will people think, a widow, still in mourning, encouraging lunchtime binge drinking.’

  ‘I didn’t,’ squeaked Etta.

  ‘Imposing yourself on the menfolk of Willowwood, calling Joey East and Alban Travis-Lock by their given names, encouraging Woody to undertake dangerous tasks with drink inside him. The Major was so appalled he couldn’t wait to tell Debbie. You were leading Dora Belvedon astray, and exacerbating Alban Travis-Lock’s drink problem with large Scotches – Ione will be incensed – not to mention picking up Drummond and Poppy in that condition. Rather early to blot your copy book so dramatically.’

  ‘We were having fun,’ protested Etta. ‘Dora and Woody drank Coke, and everyone gave me such a lovely welcome.’

  ‘You’re missing the point, Mother. Has the government thrust on binge drinking passed you by? You know how Dad loathed you drinking and gambling. Also, as we are struggling to support you, isn’t it rather selfish to squander your winnings so quickly?’

  ‘Your turn, Granny,’ said Poppy as Etta put down the receiver. ‘Why are you crying?’

  16

  At the end of October the weather turned windy and very cold. Leaves rained down. Houses were suddenly revealed behind newly bare trees. Willow spears choked Etta’s stream like shoals of goldfish. Desperate for a garden, she looked up shade-tolerant plants in a big book, hoping they’d grow in the shadow of her towering conifer hedge, and decided to dig a flower bed.

  Returning from dropping off the children one freezing cold morning, she noticed Joey’s filthy white van parked in the road. On the back someone had written: ‘I wish my wife was as dirty as this.’ ‘Me too,’ someone had written underneath. And underneath that someone else had written: ‘Also available in white.’

  Etta smiled, and looking over the wall saw Joey and Woody working on Valent’s land, blowing on their fingers, and later took them extremely welcome mugs of leek soup and bowls of black-berry crumble which she’d made for the children’s tea.

  When in turn they put up bookshelves and hung the Munnings of the mare and foal and her flower paintings, she insisted on paying them twenty pounds. Soon they were popping in every day for a cup of tea and a gossip, Joey to talk about his wild children and his volatile marriage and Valent Edwards, Woody to confide how many tree surgeons were be
ing forced out of business by Health and Safety.

  ‘I got so much work offered I could easily employ two or three assistants but I’d be clobbered by insurance. Four hundred pounds last year, four thousand this one. It’s a closed shop, the insurance companies employ a gang of inspectors to examine your equipment.’

  ‘Everyone wants to examine your equipment,’ mocked Joey. ‘Wherever he rolls up to sort trees, you see wives hanging out of the window.’

  ‘But the husbands always put you down,’ sighed Woody, ‘saying they’d do it themselves if they had the time. The real battle is views versus privacy. “My neighbour’s perfectly happy for you to cut down those trees,” they say, so you pick up your axe, then the neighbour rolls up with a shotgun.’

  ‘No cream?’ joked Joey, the morning Etta provided hot scones and home-made bramble jelly. As she got a carton of cream out of the fridge, Woody patted his flat stomach: ‘We’ll have to get out of our jeans into elasticated waistbands soon,’ he teased.

  Sitting at the table in Etta’s dark kitchen, he confessed he felt hellishly guilty about planting the mature hedge that blotted out her sunlight.

  ‘Valent insisted to please Bonny Richards, and when he asks, you jump. I would have planted hawthorn or beech, but I assumed you’d be an old cow like Romy. Sorry, Etta.’

  ‘Romy’s always shouting at the lads for making a noise drillin’ or hammerin’,’ grumbled Joey. ‘Then she went ballistic when they wolf-whistled at her in a tight jumper. Affront to her dignity, she said.’ Joey laughed. ‘Front was the operative word. She made Martin ring up Valent and complain. Valent took no notice.’

  ‘Bonny Richards doesn’t want anyone spying on her,’ explained Woody. ‘Journalists were renting houses all round her place in London. You don’t look like a member of the paparazzi, Etta, although I’m not sure I’d trust that Dora.’

  As the dark, merry eyes of Joey, who’d been given half the Daily Mail’s fee by Dora, met Etta’s, they shifted.

  ‘What’s Bonny like?’ asked Etta.

  ‘Bit skinny for me, likes to preserve a respectable image but covered plenty of sheet miles in her time,’ said Joey. ‘She’s tryin’ to improve Valent. “If you stop droppin’ your haitches, I’ll drop my knickers” sort of thing. She thinks he’s rough and she hates the country, so Valent’s trying to tempt her with the house. God, these are good.’ Joey reached out for a third scone.